Homer Glen village officials are accusing the city of Lockport of holding potential developments hostage by threatening to withhold sewage connections.
Lockport provides an area of Homer Glen access to its Bonnie Brae wastewater treatment plant on Earl Street, based on a 2018 intergovernmental agreement that runs through 2030 with an option to extend.
Homer Glen Trustee Rose Reynders said village officials are frustrated because Lockport is not holding back on developments within its city boundaries, but are saying they will not authorize new connections from any growth in Homer Glen.
“They are continuing to build, but yet they are holding our developers hostage,” Reynders said.
Homer Glen village manager Carmen Maurella said Lockport officials sent an email stating developers need to factor for sanitary sewer that does not rely on Bonnie Brae or Lockport. The email states the Bonnie Brae Sanitary District plant is owned and operated by the city, and Lockport reserves the right to maintain capacity for its own needs first.
Homer Glen needs to be upfront with developers that sewer connections must be provided by some other entity, such as Illinois American Water, another municipality or a future Homer Glen treatment plant, according to the email.
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City administrator Ben Benson said Lockport has not received or denied any applications for sewer connections for developments in Homer Glen, and would not comment whether future petitions would be denied.
Lockport city officials see developments in Homer Glen talked about in the media, but Homer Glen officials haven’t approached Lockport to talk about those developments and how they fit in Lockport’s facility planning area, Benson said.
Lockport has two short-term agreements with Homer Glen, including those that expire in 2024 and 2030, and officials from the two municipalities have to sit down and talk about long-term wastewater needs, Benson said.
Then officials from both towns can decide if the agreements need to be amended or renewed, he said. Lockport is not obligated to extend the wastewater service agreement past 2030.
A top concern for Lockport officials is that the Bonnie Brae treatment plant, which treats two million gallons of wastewater a day, is beyond its useful life span, and Lockport officials are concerned about its capacity. Decisions need to be made about fixing it or replacing it.
The plant is failing faster than was previously anticipated, and half the plant may need to be decommissioned, affecting capacity, Benson said.
Completely replacing the Bonnie Brae plant with a similar-sized plant would cost about $30 million, Benson said.
In 2018, Homer Glen approved an intergovernmental agreement with Lockport for treatment of a portion of Homer Glen’s wastewater at the Bonnie Brae plant.
Homer Glen documents from 2018 said the city of Lockport’s wastewater treatment facilities had sufficient capacity, especially at Bonnie Brae. Homer Glen documents said Lockport is legally obligated to treat the sewer flows in a portion of Homer Glen because it is in Lockport’s designated facility planning area.
Homer Glen agreed to build the connecting line, which cost about $2.5 million, to transport the wastewater to the Bonnie Brae Sanitary District by mid-2019 and paid a one-time connection fee of $50,000, according to the agreement. Homer Glen also pays Lockport a monthly sewer service charge based on how much sewage is transported to the Lockport system.
Maurella said the monthly fee is about $3,000 and the village is using less than 1% of the treatment facility’s capacity. The treatment plant serves a small portion of the village near 159th Street between Cedar and Gougar roads, and much of the land is vacant, he said.
The agreement is good through Jan. 1, 2030 and can continue for two 10 year extensions.
According to the agreement, Lockport or Homer Glen could end the agreement with a two-year notice, and Lockport is not obligated to renew the agreement beyond 2030.
A 2004 planning and boundary agreement between the two municipalities says that Lockport would provide wastewater treatment services to Homer Glen provided Lockport has capacity to treat what is to be generated by that property. The agreement says that Lockport would make the determination as to whether capacity is available on a first-come, first-served basis without regard to which side of the boundary the land is in.
Maurella said a 2017 study said Bonnie Brae was at about 30% capacity, but Lockport officials told him they were concerned the facility was deteriorating.
Developers want to ensure utility needs are met, and are being scared away because the village doesn’t control its infrastructure, Maurella said. He would like to know what happened in the years since the intergovernmental agreement was signed.
“They are basically handicapping any new development,” Maurella said.
Homer Glen may consider seeking a feasibility study that would cost about $60,000 to see if the village can build its own wastewater treatment plant or look at other options for its wastewater.
Mayor George Yukich said he plans to sit down with Lockport officials soon.
Homer Glen Trustee Ruben Pazmino said it’s important to take make plans, but in the meantime it needs to address development now.
“Their priority is Lockport, but our priority is Homer Glen,” he said. “We need to come to a solution ASAP.”
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Michelle Mullins is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.